Date: 10/09/2010

USB 3.0 SATA RAID storage devices from Fujitsu

Fujitsu has released the MB86E50 series for external USB 3.0 RAID storage devices, new additions to its lineup of USB 3.0-SATA bridge controllers. These controllers are fabricated using the Fujitsu 65nm CMOS technology

The Fujitsu MB86E50 is specifically designed for external USB 3.0 dual-port RAID and non-RAID configurations. It supports RAID 0 (striping) and RAID 1 (mirroring), JBOD (“just a bunch of disks”) and Dual LUN configurations. This bridge controller has an integrated high-speed encryption hardware engine that makes the controller a suitable choice for RAID storage applications.

The MB86E50 provides transfer speeds of up to 5Gbps, hot plugging of devices, and support for the USB attached SCSI (UAS) and Bulk-only Transport (BOT) protocols. The controller includes a 32-bit RISC MPU and an embedded SSCG to optimize SuperSpeed performance while reducing EMI. The MB86E50 includes full legacy support for high-speed USB (480Mbps) and full-speed USB (12Mbps) devices. The controller also supports SATA Gen2i (3Gbps) and Gen1i (1.5Gbps), ATA, and ATAPI drives.

The MB86E50 supports GPIOs such as pulse width modulation, provides native command queuing (NCQ) functionality, and includes a serial peripheral interface (SPI) for serial Flash ROM and multiple SPI devices. The MB86E50 features a Pb-free (RoHS) design and is packed in a compact 68-pin QFN (0.4mm pitch, 8mm x 8mm) package. Only one external crystal (25MHz) is required.

“With the MB86E50, Fujitsu enables drive and system manufacturers to offer RAID-enabled storage based on the state-of-the-art USB 3.0 standard,” said Yoshi Masuda, senior manager of marketing, Fujitsu Semiconductor America. “The USB 3.0-SATA bridge controller combines the advantages of USB 3.0 – including higher transfer rates, plug-and-play interoperability, and hot-swapping – with the greater reliability and performance potential of RAID configurations. Available with a hardware-based high-speed encryption engine, the MB86E50 USB 3.0-SATA bridge controller offers a truly robust, secure and flexible external storage solution.”

For more information visit: http://us.fujitsu.com/micro/usb